


Spoils of War

by LadyDanya



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Loot, enemy backstory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 19:28:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3907840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyDanya/pseuds/LadyDanya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every person the Inquisiton kills carries items in their pockets. Every item has a story. Every good leader stops to wonder now and then.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spoils of War

**Author's Note:**

> _I looted an odd trinket from a Venatori Zealot corpse during Demands of the Qun and thought it a very strange item for him to be carrying in that situation; I wondered how it came to be there. This is the result of those musings._

The Iron Bull braces a foot against the ribcage of a fallen Venatori marksman and yanks his battle axe free; the pressure sends the corpse rolling. _"Nice!"_ Iron Bull crows, pumping his fist in the air as he and the Inquisitor stand at the edge of the cliff, watching the body bounce from rock to rock as it tumbles to the stony beach below.

_For a split second she's back at the Crossroads again, and pulls the blade of her staff out of the throat of a female mage she's just killed, blood spurting from the artery as the shank slides free. She goes blank with horror at the irreversible act she's just committed, at the blood on her hands; she's aware that she's just crossed a momentous line, has divided her life into two distinct halves:_ before _she became a killer, and_ after _._

Funny how quickly she'd grown accustomed to murder, after that first traumatic kill, but she is determined to leave _some_ lines uncrossed; she _has_ to, or risk losing herself completely. _"Bull!"_ she snaps, a shrill hitch in her voice. "Show some respect! Those were human beings!"

"Human beings who tried to _kill us_." Iron Bull quips back, but he catches a look at her storm-cloud face and says, quietly: "Sorry, boss."

"Loot 'em up quick so we can light the signal fire," Gatt says, and the four Inquisition members dutifully diverge, each falling upon a different corpse to rifle the pockets for coin and check for bits of armor or weaponry worth salvaging. It's a dance they know well, and they're efficient at it, processing the corpses quickly and effortlessly.

The Inquisitor finds herself standing over the body of a Venatori zealot, lying face-down in the grass with one of Bianca's bolts protruding from the side of his neck. She cuts his coin purse free with a practiced nick of her boot knife, then quickly rolls him over onto his back so she can check his pockets.

Thick locks of curly black hair fall back as he's turned, revealing a face that's strangely peaceful in death, glazed amber eyes staring out across the Void. His skin is the same color as that hot cocoa drink Iron Bull shared around the campfire last night, his unkempt beard a testament to weeks of living rough on the road. He's in his mid-thirties, at a guess, older than the Inquisitor by a decade but young, far too young to throw his life away on a pointless cause. She feels her throat tighten with something that isn't quite grief, but isn't quite _not_ grief, either.

_"I knew some of them," Cullen says in the back of her head, frowning into the glass of expensive Orlesian red she's snuck from Vivienne's stores after seeing his light still burning well into the early hours of the morning. The report about the red lyrium Templars lies open on his desk, the pages smudged and tattered from repeated re-reading. "If my life had gone differently, I could have_ been _one of them."_

She dips a hand into his pocket, drawing out a switchblade that she quickly inspects - pitted blade, glass baubles on the handle, not real jewels - and discards. His other pocket yields a glass vial of something she also discards - Inquisition policy; no more drinking potions found on enemy corpses, for fear that they may contain traces of red lyrium.

She almost turns away then, but does one more pat-down of the stained leathers out of habit. She feels a lump over the man's heart, and loosens the ties of his coat to reach in. There's a hidden breast pocket sewn into the inner samite lining; she closes her hand around a small, pointy object within, wrapped in cloth, and draws it out.

"You ready, boss?" Iron Bull calls from where he stands hefting his axe over the splintered remains of an iron-bound chest _(for the Maker's sake, would he_ please _just let Varric pick the damned locks?)._

She opens her hand, folds back the cloth wrapper and takes a quick glance at the object before stuffing it into her coat pocket. Odd. Of all the objects a man might find useful on the road, or mementos he may choose to carry to remind him of home ...why _that?_

Odd ... and strangely, achingly, _human._

_She stares at the girl's body, at the long blonde ringlets framing its pale, bloodless face. She pulls away, the blade of her staff painted a dark rust-red. She's numb with the knowledge that it could have been_ her _, if her life had gone differently at any of an infinite number of critical moments over the past years leading up to this war. It could have been_ her _, scraping for survival among the rebel mages,_ her _body cooling in a puddle of rainwater on the side of the road, nameless and unmourned._

She reaches out and closes the man's eyes with gentle fingertips, the empty amber gaze blinking out of existence behind dark-lashed lids. "I'm ready," she says.

 

* * *

 

The chaos of Cumberland was a welcome change after lonely weeks of traveling the Imperial Highway by night, skirting around Nevarran settlements and retreating to the woods to avoid patrols, and the Venatori smugglers took advantage of their final opportunity to enjoy the comforts of civilization before taking ship for the Storm Coast.

They took turns prowling the city while a handful of them stayed behind at the docks to guard the crates of red lyrium. There was little reason not to - the harbormaster held true to the his end of the bargain and signed off on the shipment of _'miracle cure-all turnip-juice poultices'_ without batting an eye, tucking the pouch of coins into his jacket as he sauntered away; and the city was crowded enough that a handful of Tevinter men could wander its streets without attracting attention.

He roamed the bustling marketplace, feeling bored and out of sorts. He had little use for luxuries; the market stalls laden with glittering trinkets and awnings tied with colorful silk scarves that fluttered on a breeze might have held his attention once, when he was a younger, more foolish man, but now they seemed almost obscene. Such frivolity these people wasted their time on, while a higher purpose awaited, a cause he'd given his life to.

He'd nearly turned away, heading off to find a tavern to spend the rest of his coin in, when the little table caught his eye. It was a small, nondescript stall, a low countertop in the shade of a simple awning, covered with an array of miniature dollhouse furniture displayed against a spread-out bolt of ring velvet.

_She gasps in delight, her eyes - the rich amber color of elfroot-blossom honey - alight with joy. She reaches out a tiny hand, her dusky skin yet unmarred by time or work or injury, and touches the gift gingerly, as if afraid it will vanish. He smiles sadly; he may not be a wealthy man, and he has not given her the gifts in her short life that she deserves, but he's saved and sacrificed for this one. Every little girl, soporati or not, needs a dollhouse._

The furniture was intricate, and he spent a rapt moment opening the drawers of a bureau no bigger than a walnut and turning back the lace-trimmed coverlet on an ornately carved bed while the dwarf behind the table - _of course_ something so exquisite would be dwarven-made - watched with a wary eye.

She already had the basics in her dollhouse - a settee, a bed, a table with two spindly-legged chairs - although they were nowhere _near_ the quality of these pieces. He searched the display for something that would be new to her, something unique, and lifted an elegant item into the palm of his hand. He brushed it with his thumb, watching the cleverly made pieces move together, clicking neatly as the spinning mechanisms worked. "How much for this?" he asked.

The dwarf told him, and he balked; the price quoted was nearly as much as he had left in his purse. It wasn't like there would be much to spend his coin on where he was going, holed up in a smuggler's cave on the Ferelden coast, but....

_"Thank you, Atta!" she cries out, and she hugs him, clinging tightly to his neck as he sweeps a tangled mass of dark curls away from her forehead. The moment passes quickly, though, before she's turned her attention back to the dollhouse, opening the door again and again, watching in wonder as it swings on its tiny hinges._

"I'll take it," he said firmly.

The merchant arched an eyebrow at the strange coin, but accepted it anyway; Tevinter gold was still gold, after all, and would spend just the same. The item was wrapped in a soft white cloth and handed over; he reached into the breast of his coat and tucked it into the little hidden pocket there, making sure it was safely secured against the dangers of the road ahead. He smiled sadly, almost wistfully, as he walked away.

He'd known, when he hugged her goodbye that last time, that he would likely never see her again. Leaving had been like crossing the blade of a knife, brutal and bloody and keen; but he did this for _her_ , following he who would restore Tevinter to its former glory so that _she_ could live a better life.

And yet ... if he _did_ make it home to her someday, somehow, it wouldn't do to arrive without a very special gift in hand.

He patted the pocket, feeling the tiny object just there above his heart, and headed back toward the docks.

 

* * *

 

The Inquisitor kneels before her bed, lifting the brocade dust ruffle and reaching for the little chest she keeps hidden there. She pulls it out, drags it across the floor, and sits with her back against the wall, the small chest between her outspread legs.

She lifts the lid and takes the items out one by one. She's done this so many times that she knows them by heart, knows the shape of them under her fingertips as she reaches into the crate, knows their edges and their weight in the palm of her hand as she lifts them out and holds them.

She remembers every body that she's looted them from. Every last one.

There's a lover's knot, the right half worn on a slender silver chain by a mage they'd killed in the Witchwood, the left half clutched in the rigid fingers of a dead Templar they'd found by the side of the road; the jagged edges fit together so perfectly that there was no doubt that they were halves of the same whole, despite being found so many miles apart.

There's a Fereldan medallion of service, its ribbon frayed by years of wear, yet the medal itself burnished brightly, as if it had been lovingly polished again and again, clearly a source of pride to the bandit who had fallen to them in Crestwood.

There's a weathered old cameo depicting the Maker's bride, such an unlikely item for a grizzled old mercenary rogue to carry that she's certain it was a token from some lady love of his youth, kept and treasured among the poison vials in his belt pouch.

She lines the items up on the floor, taking a moment to remember each person, each _life_ , as she does so. An Orlesian toy soldier, its paint chipped and flaking. An engraved locket that bedevils her, its jammed lid refusing to open no matter how badly she wants to see the portrait inside. A military braid of rank. The stub of a Chantry candle.

This is what she does, every time she returns to Skyhold covered in the blood of more people she has, out of some necessity or other, killed. She takes the time to remind herself, again and again, that her enemies were _people_ , and their lives mattered.

She reaches into her pocket and pulls out her newest treasure, wrapped in a white cloth dotted with the rusty red specks of a stranger's blood. She commits him to memory, the dark-haired Venatori with the amber eyes, as she unwraps the trinket and traces its curves and angles with her fingertips, memorizing its weight and feel, wondering again how he came to carry this particular object with him in his travels.

She's certain she could ask Cole to tell her more about the people who once owned these items; she's also certain she doesn't want to. She's not sure she could carry that weight on her shoulders; the trinkets themselves are enough.

"Inquisitor?" a voice calls from the doorway; she starts, and makes a move to secret her collection from view, even though the messenger is at the bottom of the stairs, well out of sight. "You're needed in the war room."

She returns the items to the velvet-lined chest just as slowly and reverently as she removed them. "I'll be there in a moment," she calls out as her fingers do their nimble work, carefully placing the trinkets together so they do not chip or scratch.

She lifts her latest addition and nestles it carefully in the box - a miniature spinning wheel, dollhouse-sized, cunningly made with tiny, exquisite gears that click together as the wheel is turned. Then she tucks the chest safely back under her bed, and heads downstairs with a heavy heart to plan more war and death.

**Author's Note:**

> [](http://s1148.photobucket.com/user/ladydanya/media/spinning%20wheel_zps6n27mcuw.jpg.html)  
>   
> 
> Come say hi to me on Tumblr! [ladydanya.tumblr.com](http://ladydanya.tumblr.com)


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